


Bravery, Bitches

by SabbyStarlight



Category: The Magicians
Genre: Eliot gets to be brave, Fluff, M/M, Reunion, Yet another fix-it fic, canon? What's canon?, post-monster, queliot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-06-24 18:02:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19728901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SabbyStarlight/pseuds/SabbyStarlight
Summary: Quentin just smiled, tightening his hold on Eliot's hand and drawing it up to press a kiss to his knuckles.  "We earned it.  This.  Us.  It's going to take more than some shitty writing from whoever's in charge of our universe to keep us apart."





	Bravery, Bitches

**Author's Note:**

> What’s this?! Yet another fluffy Queliot reunion/Post Monster fic? From me? Shocking, right?! Prompted by the fact that I was rewatching Knight of Crowns (which is my favorite underrated episode) and decided that if the writers really wanted to do something groundbreaking that people would write college essays on in the future, they could have focused on the parallel of Quentin asking El if he was brave during the crowning ceremony and Eliot deciding to be brave in 4x05.

They are laying in bed, despite the fact that, judging by the sunlight streaming through the penthouse's gauzy white curtains, it has to be well into the afternoon. Quentin's head is on Eliot's chest and he is blatantly ignoring the bandaged still-healing ax wound well within his view, choosing instead to entertain himself by twisting the older man's hand around in his own. Playing with fingers, taking full advantage of the fact that El hadn't gotten back to wearing all his rings yet, tracing the lines across his palms and intertwining the hand among the both of his own. Eliot's free hand had taken up residence in Quentin's hair and hadn't left since, idly scratching across his scalp and running his fingers through the strands, trying to get himself reaccustomed to the new, shorter, length. 

Weeks had passed since Margo had forcibly driven The Monster out of Eliot and Quentin had tossed the bottles containing both him and his sister into The Seam, finally ridding the world of them once and for all. The battle axes, while effective, had nearly cost Eliot his life. Ironically, if Quentin had hesitated there in the forest where Eliot was bleeding out, if he had followed every instinct he had screaming at him to check on Eliot, to wrap his arms around him and to never let go, to make sure, absolutely, positively, truly sure, that he really had gotten his Eliot back, instead of grabbing Penny's hand and being transported into the mirror realm to dispose of the bottles, he wouldn't have survived either. Just a moment later and Everett would have shown up in time to stop him. Instead, he appeared and, having seen that he was too late, decided that the only option left was to dramatically hurtle himself into the slowly closing rift, taking his life and promptly erasing his name from their seemingly ever-growing list of problems. 

What a sick joke that would have been, Eliot had joked later from his hospital bed, hurting but alive and happier than he had been in maybe in this entire lifetime, gripping Quentin's hand as if he never intended to let go, if the universe had hated the thought of them being together so much that it killed one of them just to prevent them from getting the happy ending they so rightfully deserved. Quentin had just smiled, tightening his hold on Eliot's hand and drawing it up to press a kiss to his knuckles. "We earned it. This. Us. It's going to take more than some shitty writing from whoever's in charge of our universe to keep us apart." 

"Why do I feel like you're brain's working a mile a minute?" Eliot asked, voice rumbling loud in Quentin's ear from where it was pressed against his chest. "It's too early for thinking." 

Quentin laughed. "I'm pretty sure it's past lunchtime. Not exactly early."

"I haven't had coffee yet." Eliot shrugged. "It's early." 

"Well someone made a pot of it earlier, I smelled it," Quentin rolled off of Eliot and back onto the pile of pillows at the top of the bed. "But we were... occupied." 

"That we were." Eliot agreed with a wink. "But don't change the subject, what were you thinking about so loud?" 

Quentin sighed, knowing that there was no point in denying that his thoughts had traveled to less than pleasant territories. Ever since he had gotten El back something was different. They didn't discuss the past few months they had been apart. The Monster and what he put Quentin through were pushed to the farthest reaches of their minds, as were any discussions of how Eliot had passed the time while he was possessed. In every other aspect of his life, Eliot had come back open in a way that Quentin had never seen before. But Quentin was nothing if not dangerously curious. "I don't want you to take this as me complaining," He warned. "Because that's so not the case. I just... I want to know what happened, El." 

He watched Eliot's eyes darken as he built up his walls once again, feigning confusion. 'I'm not following." He lied. 

Quentin pushed on, determined, taking Eliot's hand back between his own. "I know we don't talk about it, not really. It was awful and traumatic and you want to move past it, and I get that, I really do. But sometime between Castle Blackspire and that afternoon in the park, something changed. We, I, became an option again. And you chose me this time. And it's driving me crazy not knowing why." 

"Bravery, Waugh," Eliot whispered to himself, voice so low Quentin could barely make out the words. "You fucking promised him." Before he took a shuddering breath and sat up, fidgeting with the twisted bed sheets for a moment before beginning. "Um, so I was stuck in my mind, right?" Quentin nodded. "It wasn't as awful as that could have been, honestly. It was way better than what you all were dealing with out here in the real world. Apparently, when the Monster takes, no, took," he corrected as he shook his head. "He's gone now. When he took over a host, in order to keep that person from realizing what was happening or caring enough to try to stop it, their mind builds this kind of, safe haven. Your Happy Place, Charlton called it." 

"Charlton, he was the guy," Quentin interrupted, he knew the basics, just enough to follow the story. "The Monster's host before you?" 

Eliot nodded, and his lips turned up in an almost fond smile. "Strange guy, kind of endearing though. Anyway, my mind built this freakishly accurate version of the Cottage, and I just got to, live there. Do whatever I wanted, really. Sometimes it was just me and Bambi, sometimes it was packed in the middle of a classic Physical Kid's rager. Whatever I wanted."

"Margo was there?" Quentin asked. He had always assumed Eliot had been stuck there alone. 

"Usually, yeah." Eliot shrugged "You, Fen, everyone else too, sometimes. Whoever I wanted to pass the time with." 

"Well, what did I say different in there that made you change your mind?" Quentin asked, only half teasing. 

"That's the thing, Q. It wasn't you. Not really, I mean, it was, but it was just my memories of you. Nothing new, nothing different. That's a lot of what the Happy Place was, good memories." He paused. This was the part he really didn't want to talk about. "But there were bad ones too. That day? In the park when I broke through? In order to get there, I had to search through all my worst memories. All the horrible, repressed memories that I don't think about because they’re too painful. And the big one? The one that hurt enough to push that thing out of my head for just a moment to let me talk to you? Was you, Quentin. Sitting there beneath Margo's bloodstained wedding arch, peach juice dripping from my fingers, you staring up at me with those unfairly pretty brown eyes asking for a chance for you and me to become us again, here this time, in this world. The sheer bravery of that moment, of you offering yourself to me. And I turned you down simply because I was too afraid to trust what I already knew. What I had known years before we stepped through that confounded clock. I was too afraid to love you, Q. So I hurt you instead. And I've never forgiven myself for that." 

"El," Quentin began. 

"No, let me finish." Eliot interrupted before he could get any further. "I need to say it. In order to walk through the door and get to you, I had to relive that moment, Q. I stood there and watched myself turn you down, reject you, and all I wanted, when I was done telling myself what a complete and utter dick I had been, of course, was to wrap you in my arms and kiss away the hurt I had put on your face." He shrugged and huffed out a little laugh. "So I did. And memory or not, it reaffirmed everything I knew deep down. And I promised you, Quentin, that If I ever made it out of that place, if by some miracle that Monster didn't win, that I was going to be braver. And it would all be because of you." 

"You promised a memory of me that you would be brave," Quentin repeated, eyes flickering across the room as his mind struggled to process the words. "So when you came back you just said, 'What the hell, bravery, bitches.' and took a chance, hoping I would still feel the same way?" 

"It seems to have worked in my favor." Eliot pointed out, leaning down and pressing a quick kiss to Quentin's temple. 

A laughed bubbled up from Quentin's chest and despite his best efforts, he couldn't contain it. 

"You know, I've spent the past few weeks debating telling you this story and nowhere in any of the scenarios I imagined did I predict you would find it funny," Eliot said, crossing his arms and glaring down at Quentin who was still sprawled out across the bed. 

"No, no, it's not funny," Quentin assured, scrambling to sit up. "It's just, you didn't have to do all this. I mean, you literally almost died, El. And went poking through the worst of the worst of your memories to find me and you think I'm the reason you're brave? Eliot, you are the strongest, best, bravest person I've ever met. And whether you think so or not, it didn't start when you walked through that door in your mind. Do you remember when we first got to Fillory? And we got our crowns?" 

Eliot nodded, though he wasn't quite sure where Quentin was going with this particular train of thought. Of course, he remembered that day on Coronation Island, kneeling on the rocky beach, staring up at Quentin in awe, wondering what he did right in some past life to deserve someone as good and true and pure as Quentin to be smiling at him like he was in that moment. It was a memory he had often returned to, while bored and trapped in his mind, and upon reliving it he had determined that that was the moment things had shifted from being a simple crush on a cute first-year to actual feelings for a man he could see a future with. He still couldn't believe that he, of all things, could make Quentin smile like that, but he wanted nothing more than to spend another lifetime making it happen. 

"I was getting ready to place that crown on your head and call you High King Eliot the Brave, remember?" Quentin smiled, reaching out and taking Eliot's hands. "It was you who said you weren't. You've been brave all along El, you didn't need me to teach you."

Eliot bit his lip, wondering if maybe, just maybe, Quentin was right. "I didn't need somebody to show me how to be brave." He finally agreed. "I just needed somebody worth being brave for."

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not sure I’ll ever be done finding missed opportunities from this show. But, I guess I’ll just keep on writing fix-its and hoping people keep wanting to read them.


End file.
